Hi guys, is there a clean generic windows phone 7 os? just like desktops were we get a retail os, is there one for phones? and is it flash-able with all phone?
No
No.
It would certainly be interesting to get hold of the OS as Microsoft delivers it to OEMs to begin the process of adapting it to a certain phone model, writing or modifying device drivers, etc., but it seems nothing like that was ever leaked.
WP is closed, as is iOS; for the reasonably open Android there is of course something like a "generic" version; you could even compile and produce one yourself.
There isn't really any such thing as a "clean generic" phone OS, anyhow. Unlike desktop OSes, phone OSes don't ship with support for the massive array of hardware configurations that are found in the wild. Instead, phone OSes rely on a Board Support Package, commonly simply called the firmware, which has the various drivers needed to interface with that specific model's hardware. This is why, for example, even though the source code is available for the Android Open Source Project upon which CyanogenMod is based, it still takes a long time to get fully functional CM ports to each individual device. On things like WP7, where the source code isn't available (except for the kernel and some core libraries), it's even harder.
However, if what you really mean is you want a "clean" ROM that has no carrier customizations in it, there are "open market" ROMs available for many WP7 devices. These ROMs are still specific to the device whose BSP they contain, but are not specific to any mobile operator and usually not to any region.
thanks for the info guys, but it looks like there are no open market roms for the omnia w yet, well, not yet anyway, will keep an eye out now that i know what to look for,
thanks again guys
Answer is yes and no. No oem device created by Microsoft, but there is Nokia. As you know Nokia is part of Microsoft Windows Phone hardware partner. More options etc has Nokia.
Sent from my Lumia 900 using Board Express
Related
I am not a developer so I don't understand why it is so hard to receive updates on some android devices.
Today, particularly I am concerned with the ICS update . Why is it that even though TF meets all the hardware requirements it still can't receive ICS?
To a n average user like me this is like saying "we both have similar computers but Windows 7 won't work on yours and it's nothing do do with hardware".......
it is not the same at all. For windows computers all of the components are supported by their respective manufactures and all of those manufactures write the drivers for the operating system. By doing this you can install windows (or linux) on most platforms because of the cumulative support. In android there are many more steps. Most drivers have to be written by a single manufacturer which may get hardware from other manufactures but they do not provide software support for that hardware. writing those drivers takes some time and implementing them into each release of android as it changes the parameters it accepts ect. then each device has to be tested rather than just testing one part to make sure everything is in order then it goes through google who do even more checks to make sure that it is near perfect before it is released to the general public
Which smartphone has the source for the drivers availbale at the moment?
To know what to choose in case i want to port tizen to it...
frullewulle said:
Which smartphone has the source for the drivers availbale at the moment?
To know what to choose in case i want to port tizen to it...
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Click to collapse
I just wanted to post a new thread with the same question.
Also, which are the phones with the best reverse-engineered drivers? And is there much difference between this and open drivers?
If you have open drivers you should pretty easily be able to port every system to it that supports the same specs as screen resolution, etc, right?
Unrelashade said:
I just wanted to post a new thread with the same question.
Also, which are the phones with the best reverse-engineered drivers? And is there much difference between this and open drivers?
If you have open drivers you should pretty easily be able to port every system to it that supports the same specs as screen resolution, etc, right?
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Click to collapse
Although it would be reasonable for you to think so, you would also be incorrect. The reason why this isn't the case is because hardware manufacturers each have their own different firmware that they use, which causes a lot of the bifurcation of the Android ecosystem. Just because you have two phones that are identical in every hardware fashion doesn't mean that their firmware is the same, so there is no guarantee that one set of drivers would work on different devices.
syung said:
Although it would be reasonable for you to think so, you would also be incorrect. The reason why this isn't the case is because hardware manufacturers each have their own different firmware that they use, which causes a lot of the bifurcation of the Android ecosystem. Just because you have two phones that are identical in every hardware fashion doesn't mean that their firmware is the same, so there is no guarantee that one set of drivers would work on different devices.
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Ooohh, so underneath android and its Linux kernel lies a firmware that handles communication between the kernel/ Android and the drivers/ hardware? So I'd need open drivers and open firmware to be able to port anything with ease to this device (at least theoretically)?
Unrelashade said:
Ooohh, so underneath android and its Linux kernel lies a firmware that handles communication between the kernel/ Android and the drivers/ hardware? So I'd need open drivers and open firmware to be able to port anything with ease to this device (at least theoretically)?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, but practically this is impossible as firmware comes straight from the manufacturer, so even if you could develop some sort of open firmware (basically you would be making an open BIOS), you would have no way to install it onto the actual device, since they are hard coded into the chip. You would need specialized tools in order modify on that level.
syung said:
Yes, but practically this is impossible as firmware comes straight from the manufacturer, so even if you could develop some sort of open firmware (basically you would be making an open BIOS), you would have no way to install it onto the actual device, since they are hard coded into the chip. You would need specialized tools in order modify on that level.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Awesome, I'm finally learning what I want to know!
So if there was a manufacturer who gave this firmware/ BIOS code away (because it's an old model or they have been convinced by the community or it's a dedicated device for developers or whatever) then it would be finally easy to port every system to it (that supports the hardware)?
And how come it is possible to port e.g. Linux to Android devices without having the sourcecode of the firmware/ BIOS? Because they reverse engineered it? And if you have a device with closed drivers you have to reverse engineer the drivers *and* the firmware/ BIOS? How come no manufacturer tried to build a developer device with open firmware/ BIOS since it would give them a lot of support from developers?
Theoretically yes, but then you would still face the issue of how you are going to interface with the hardware, as the chips were not designed to be interfaced with via usb devices. They tend to be programmed at production then never altered again.
Android is linux-based, so it would stand to reason that you could port a stripped-down version of linux onto the device. Using other tools, you can create a VM on the Android device to have a fully functioning version of linux, but this is all software-level, not physical level. And the reason why they don't make open BIOS is for the same reason textbook manufacturers keep making new versions of textbook that are almost exactly the same.
Updates for Android devices are always rolled by the gadget manufacturer, so every time Google introduces a new update we have to wait till the manufacturer of the device decides to roll it out, this obviously takes a lot of time and puts Android at a disadvantage against Apple and Microsoft.
For a Windows device irrespective of the manufacturer if Microsoft rolls out an update all can avail of that update through windows update. Android also being an open platform like Windows should be able to do the same.
If I have a software CD of Windows 7 I can install the software in any manufacturers PC and use it. I may just need to do some additional driver installation if required.
Why can't Android develop their platform to function in a similar manner so that once a new version of Android is released I can install it it any device and o fcourse put in the specific drivers to make it work if required.
With the approach of Microsoft looking very prominent now for both Smartphones and Tablets, this may just be a warning bell for Android, I hope they have their eyes and ears open.
Would be nice to know the views of others. As an Android user do you feel this would be a good step for Google?
kaus1108 said:
I may just need to do some additional driver installation if required.
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Click to collapse
The above is the key sentence in your post. The problem is that without the correct hardware drivers for your specific phone the OS may not be able to boot at all and will certainly have limited functionality - just look at the issues there are with trying to run leaded ICS / JB ROMs on phones that don't have an official version of the ROM available with the correct drivers yet.
The reason that Microsoft is able to push out a new OS and have it (mostly) work on any manufacturers PC, with any hardware, is that all the hardware manufacturers are given alpha/beta copies of Windows to test their hardware on and to allow them to build the drivers well in advance of the OS being released by the guys in Redmond.
Google don't do that. They release the OS immediately they have hardware support and compatibility for their devices - and let everybody else deal with the aftermath
windows is the opposite from open platform!
android is an open platform.
the phone makers are free to use android as they wish, they can decide if to upgrade or not.
google only realeses the source code.
XDA is there for providing the latest update.
My phone was supported by Samsung till Gingerbread. But I got jelly bean from XDA devs just after a week after the source code release.
But it does have some bugs which cannot be solved without Samsung's help.
But if you wanted the fastest OEM updates, buy a Nexus.
But 50% of the people are normal users who do not care about updates and new android versions.
Sent from my GT-S5830 using Tapatalk 2
SimonTS said:
The above is the key sentence in your post. The problem is that without the correct hardware drivers for your specific phone the OS may not be able to boot at all and will certainly have limited functionality - just look at the issues there are with trying to run leaded ICS / JB ROMs on phones that don't have an official version of the ROM available with the correct drivers yet.
The reason that Microsoft is able to push out a new OS and have it (mostly) work on any manufacturers PC, with any hardware, is that all the hardware manufacturers are given alpha/beta copies of Windows to test their hardware on and to allow them to build the drivers well in advance of the OS being released by the guys in Redmond.
Google don't do that. They release the OS immediately they have hardware support and compatibility for their devices - and let everybody else deal with the aftermath
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you for the response and I do agree with what you say and the key to it is that there are certain things that Microsoft do and Google don't and how it is going to impact users in the future.
I remember when I moved from Windows Vista to Windows 7 all the Vista drivers were functioning allright after installing Windows 7 and I have also faced situations where I did not have certain drivers but the PC still functioned on generic drivers provided in the Windows software.
Don't you feel it would be much better if Google just released a Jelly Bean OS and left it to us to install it and I am sure that based on devices already in the market those drivers can always be included in the OS and each phone would pick its own based on its hardware. Only the new devices would need new ones which Google may not be able to provide. If this were true today I would be installing JB in my Galaxy S3 and not have to wait for Sammy.
djbijo said:
windows is the opposite from open platform!
android is an open platform.
the phone makers are free to use android as they wish, they can decide if to upgrade or not.
google only realeses the source code.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, Windows is quite open. Apple is the closed one.
Sent from my MB508 using xda premium
I have wondered this for a very long time
Why isn't there any phone hardware which exists (that I'm aware of) where you can simply install any OS you like without jumping through hoops?
I'm referring to something similar to a PC. When you build a PC, it is all standard hardware and you can load any os you want on it, endless flavors of linux, current or old versions of windows, etc. It is simple. Both windows and linux can generally detect all your hardware and install drivers, it is simple.
With phones however it seems you are always limited. You have to find ways to root them, usually requiring exploiting some vulnerability. Hope the bootloader is unlocked. Assuming you aren't a talented developer (like most typical people), you then must search for roms for the phone, usually made by various people on forums sites or similar. It is a big mess. Or if you don't customize it, your stuck with some bloated os that the manufacturer will fail to update.
I don't understand why phones are such a mess like this, and why you can't just buy an OS-less phone, and simply install vanilla android, or any other standardized open source os on it, similar to how things work on a PC?
There aren't any unified standard in the embedded devices in general and in phones in particular. The reason that you can install compatible OS on the PC is because IBM PC is a standard, which specifies how the PC should boot, where to search for the bootloader, what kind of partition table should be on the HDD, how the devices should be connected, how to probe for the hardware, how software should use hardware, and lots of other things.
In embedded word, there aren't such standard. Until recently, every System-on-Chip used its own boot specifications and bootloaders incompatible with each other. Only in the last 2 years something started to change in a better way.
I am a retired programmer with too much time on my hands; as such, I wrote a complaint to a regulatory body about how I can't install the operating system I want on my device because it will render it unusable (if I can't call for help on a phone because of drivers, what good is it?). I received a response requesting an interview with an officer who specializes in anticompetition cases and I would like to make sure I have my eggs all in one basket.
The current mobile phone market I liken to the desktop OS market of the 90s, where you had companies like Xerox, Microsoft, IBM, and so on; in the 90s, there were antitrust lawsuits where a particular company was accused of intentionally creating barriers to customers seeking to install software by other companies on personal computers. Obviously, that was settled in the 2000s, but IMO it did appear to make a positive change even if we are still fighting against IE. This may not be relevant, but that's what my mind went to when I realized I couldn't uninstall the Play Store.
Nobody uses "cellular telephones" as telephones anymore; instead, they are mobile computers. Computers in the 80s/90s had plenty of OS options (you may recall using OS/2 or BSD), but you can't do that with mobile computers... is that a good thing?
In my retirement, I'd like to develop and build a mobile phone operating system that is not android (nor lineageOS); this would either be Linux or BSD-based with a simple package manager, but the user would have the option to compile their own software also. This would ideally *not* hinder the underlying function of the device (i.e. telephony), but I don't see how manufacturers could be compelled to provide binary drivers. The current mobile market makes it obviously a very high barrier to entry for any who want to develop new operating systems for mobile computers. Is this anticompetitive? Perhaps not, but I'd like to hear some opinions and if you would kindly point me towards some resources I would appreciate it.
IMO the OS is not the problem - a command line based OS can be written by any talented student nowadays - preferably in C++, yes there are enough templates on the Internet, it is the device drivers what have to fit the hardware that make the whole thing difficult. I know that some OEMs put their device drivers' source code to the public.
jwoegerbauer said:
IMO the OS is not the problem - a command line based OS can be written by any talented student nowadays - preferably in C++, yes there are enough templates on the Internet, it is the device drivers what have to fit the hardware that make the whole thing difficult. I know that some OEMs put their device drivers' source code to the public.
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Click to collapse
To install a new OS on a phone, the phone must first be booted into a bootloader such that the 'image' of the OS can be loaded. The image for the OS should be built with the drivers present such that when booting, the OS kernel can load the relevant drivers as it probes the hardware in the phone, and then the software installed on the user layer can access that hardware through the relevant system calls. How possible is it for the bootloader to load a custom OS in the general sense? The majority of instructions I find are on enthusiast/developer websites with the actual manufacturers giving basically no input (that is to say, I haven't seen on manufacturer's websites or instruction manuals where they give instructions for booting your choice of OS).
Would it be fair to say that mobile developers, like Google/Samsung/LG/Amazon/etc are restricting users from being able to install their own OS on their device? Is driver access a reasonable thing to ask for?
Again, I'm retired, so I have time on my hands, but I'm old and there's realistically not a lot of that time left. I don't want to try developing my own BSD-based mobile OS if there's no way for me to install it on my own devices; that effort could go into another project if it is otherwise wasted. I suppose it is worth asking whether I should bother returning the bureau's request for an interview.